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We are proud to reintroduce our popular GNU/Linux Inside stickers. The new sticker features the same artwork as the classic GNU/Linux Inside sticker but is now on a much more durable sticker backing, perfect for putting on your phone or laptop. The stickers are 1-inch in diameter, and made of heavy duty aluminum.

I have several backup servers that run the excellent rsnapshot software, which uses Secure Shell (SSH) for remote access. The SSH private key of the backup server can be a weak link in the overall security. To see how it can be a problem, consider if someone breaks into your backup server and manages to copy your SSH private key, they will now have the ability to login to all machines that you take backups off (and that should be all of your machines, right?).

It’s no doubt that one of the leaders for network equipment is Cisco Systems. Newer Cisco devices are starting to use what Cisco calls its “IOS-XE” operating system, which is a customized flavor of GNU/Linux. Yes, GNU/Linux, which should not come as any surprise as GNU/Linux is used on countless high level appliances and security devices. In fact, there are hardly any appliances or security devices that run Windows for the operating system. Why? Because GNU/Linux is highly scalable, powerful, reliable, and a better overall solution than Windows.

I have always been a huge fan of using GNU/Linux for building my own firewall boxes. First, old machines like Pentium II or Pentium III boxes are perfect for this. These boxes will easily run even the latest version of GNU/Linux. The Linux kernel itself has many functions built in for network routing, traffic shaping, bridging, virtual IP addresses, and just about anything else that a firewall needs to support. And the fact that Cisco now leverages the Linux kernel for its appliances tells me that even Cisco agrees.

New Releases

Gentoo Family

Sabayon is a Linux distribution described by its developers as “… a bleeding edge operating system that is both stable and reliable.” It is based on Gentoo, a source-based (Linux) distribution. The latest edition, Sabayon 7, was released just last week (October 10 2011 to be exact). Sabayon has support for all the known free desktop environments, but this release, as is customary, includes 32- and 64-bit installation images for GNOME 3, the K Desktop Environment, and Xfce only.

Fabio Erculiani proudly announced last evening, October 18th, the immediate availability for download of the Sabayon Linux 7 CoreCDX, SpinBase, ServerBase and OpenVZ editions.

Sabayon Linux 7 CoreCDX, ServerBase and SpinBase editions are designed for Linux experts and advanced users that want to set up a home server or create their very own operating system, based on Sabayon.

Debian Family

Derivatives

Canonical/Ubuntu

Ubuntu has made some major wins this year as Indian Judiciary system switches to Ubuntu from RHEL. One of the reasons could be Ubuntu’s ease of use and focus on desktop users as compared to RHEL. Ubuntu also made a major win by being selected by Amazon and HP for their servers. 2011 may bring the much needed profitability to Canonical, the company which has been funding Ubuntu for all these years.

The Ubuntu Developer Summit 2011 is approaching and, as is customary, Mark Shuttleworth has laid out his objectives and themes for the fourth Ubuntu LTS (Long Term Support) release, Ubuntu 12.04, recently named Precise Pangolin. The two foremost issues on Shuttleworth’s mind are the fact that 12.04 is an LTS release and Ubuntu’s presence in the cloud; he is also aware of what Ubuntu owes to the work of other developers.

Let’s get one thing clear, Gnome 3 is here to stay no matter what Linus Torvalds thinks. Yes, it will continue to improve and add more features as the time passes by. Same will happen to Canonical’s Unity. It is the future. You can either hold onto the past and refuse to embrace newer technologies, or take the road to innovation. I never had issues with Unity or Gnome 3 shell, I had issues with bugs in Ubuntu 11.10, which stopped me from doing important work. I do trust the developers of Canonical (and they have some of the best developers in the world) to fix those bugs.

When I look at Windows 8 or Apple Mac, I feel lucky. While Windows users will be stuck with Windows 8′ Metro UI, we have couple of options. If you don’t like Gnome 3 Shell, you can go to Unity or XFCE or LXDE or KDE.

“I just got to look at the countdown and….wow is that REALLY dumb!” said slashdot blogger hairyfeet. “Did they learn anything from those moronic house parties MSFT had? If you want to generate buzz that sure isn’t the way to do it. Is there ANY non Ubuntu user that would be impressed?”

Flavours and Variants

This tutorial shows how you can set up a Kubuntu 11.10 desktop that is a full-fledged replacement for a Windows desktop, i.e. that has all the software that people need to do the things they do on their Windows desktops. The advantages are clear: you get a secure system without DRM restrictions that works even on old hardware, and the best thing is: all software comes free of charge. Kubuntu 11.10 is derived from Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot) and uses the KDE desktop instead of the GNOME desktop.

Speaking at this week’s AsiaD conference in Hong Kong, Andy Rubin, Google Senior VP of Mobile and the man in charge of Android development, confirmed that the source code for the next major update to Android, version 4.0, will be available as open source “a couple of weeks” after the recently announced Galaxy Nexus smartphone ships next month.

Code-named “Ice Cream Sandwich” (ICS), Android 4.0 was first revealed yesterday (19 October) alongside the new Nexus device, at a joint Google and Samsung event. The new version of the mobile operating system includes features from both the current phone version, 2.3.x “Gingerbread”, and the tablet version, 3.x “Honeycomb”. While it will reportedly work on both large- and small-screen devices, it was only demonstrated on the Galaxy Nexus smartphone.

Google was criticized for holding back the source code of Honeycomb. There was a valid reason behind that move. Google wanted to bring an end to the fragmentation in the Android market. Releasing the Honeycomb code meant giving it to OEMs to put it on their devices, which would further increase the fragmentation.

Google clearly stated that Honeycomb was a quick-fix for tablets and it was working on the next version of Android which will run on all Android devices – it was dubbed IceCream Sandwich. Google made it clear that it will release the source code of IceCream as soon as it is available.

The Android source repository has been offline since the kernel.org compromise; it has now returned on a new site. Services like Gerritt will take a little longer still. “To reiterate, these servers contain only the ‘gingerbread’ and ‘master’ branches from the old AOSP servers. We plan to release the source for the recently-announced Ice Cream Sandwich soon, once it’s available on devices.”

Events

Web Browsers

Mozilla

I am in Toronto right now, spending a week with Mobile folks. It has been about 6 weeks since I started working on a mobile extension, and the list of dirty tricks we employing to get things done is growing. Some of these hacks are there because there is no alternative, and some are there because I just didn’t figure out the right way to do it.

SaaS

Linux server specialist SGI is moving further into the big-data market: it has signed a partnership agreement with Cloudera Inc., the provider of Apache Hadoop-based data management. Under the terms of the agreement, SGI will distribute Cloudera software pre-installed on SGI Hadoop Clusters.

FSF/FSFE/GNU/SFLC

This week’s FLOSS4Science interview is with Jesper Schmidt Hansen, nanofluidics scientist and author of the GNU Octave Beginner’s Guide, one of the few books on GNU Octave besides the official GNU Octave manuals. Remember that you can leave comments or questions at the end of the post. Enjoy the interview!

Jesper: I currently hold a position at Roskilde University, Denmark, where I investigate fundamental phenomena in nanofluidics. I have been a postdoctoral fellow at Swinburne University, Australia, and at Pierre et Marie Curie, France. Before my academic career I did a Ph.D. in soft condensed matter.

Project Releases

US security company Rapid7 has announced the launch of a Community Edition of the popular Metasploit exploit framework. According to Rapid7 Chief Security Officer and Metasploit Creator HD Moore, “The best way to tackle the increasing information security challenge is to share knowledge between practitioners, open source projects and commercial vendors.”

HUMOR: Steve Ballmer, the chair-throwing CEO of Microsoft, yesterday said that you need to be a computer scientist to use Android. He said that Windows Mobile is the best selling mobile platform in the world and even the dumbest person on the planet can use the Windows Phone. “You don’t have to be smart to use Windows phones,” said Mr Ballmer.

Internet/Net Neutrality

Negotiations on a weak Net neutrality resolution are coming to an end at the EU Parliament, with the vote taking place tomorrow. After much reluctance, the conservative (EPP) group has finally agreed to endorse a call for a timely assessment of further regulation on Net neutrality. However, the text still includes a major loophole allowing operators to implement Internet access restrictions on the pretext of managing congestion.

The “Industry” Committee of the EU Parliament unanimously adopted a resolution on Net neutrality. Through this vote asking the European Commission to promptly assess the need for further legislative action, the Parliament is taking a strong stance in favour of Net neutrality. Pressure now increases on EU Commissioner Neelie Kroes, who may soon be forced to break away with her failed “wait and see” approach and take action.

ACTA

Meanwhile there is still some struggle about the delivery of the Europarl legal opinions, and it seems unclear to observers what DEVE would do. This week there was a dinner meeting of the Kangeroo Group. Velasco-Martins of the Commission claimed they could properly respond to any criticism and asked member states to be more specific. Given the track record of the Commission in the case, the legal loopholes and a missing criminal acquis their chuzpe is astonishing. The Commission largly builds its confidence that the Treaty is legally permissable on the TRIPS agreement which was concluded by Member States prior to all the relevant EU Treaties reforms, and with a competence reservation by the Union.

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The lunacy of the EPO with its patent maximalism will likely go unchecked (and uncorrected) if Battistelli gets his way and turns the EPO into another SIPO (Croatian in the human rights sense and Chinese in the quality sense)

Another long installment in a multi-part series about UPC at times of post-truth Battistelli-led EPO, which pays the media to repeat the lies and pretend that the UPC is inevitable so as to compel politicians to welcome it regardless of desirability and practicability

Implementing yet more of his terrible ideas and so-called 'reforms', Battistelli seems to be racing to the bottom of everything (patent quality, staff experience, labour rights, working conditions, access to justice etc.)

"Good for trolls" is a good way to sum up the Unitary Patent, which would give litigators plenty of business (defendants and plaintiffs, plus commissions on high claims of damages) if it ever became a reality

Microsoft's continued fascination with and participation in the effort to undermine Alice so as to make software patents, which the company uses to blackmail GNU/Linux vendors, widely acceptable and applicable again